


Miscommunication

by thealphagate_archivist



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Action/Adventure, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-14
Updated: 2006-03-14
Packaged: 2019-02-02 00:38:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12716193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thealphagate_archivist/pseuds/thealphagate_archivist
Summary: A familiar alien encounter brings Jack and Daniel to their senses.





	Miscommunication

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the archivists: this story was originally archived at [The Alpha Gate](https://fanlore.org/wiki/The_Alpha_Gate), a Stargate SG-1 archive, which began migration to the AO3 in 2017 when its hosting software, eFiction, was no longer receiving support. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in November 2017. We e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are this creator and it hasn't transferred to your AO3 account, please contact us using the e-mail address on [The Alpha Gate collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/thealphagate).

  
Author's notes: Minor violence and, yes - actual sex!  


* * *

Daniel lay in bed, watching the chinks of sunlight slowly creeping across the ceiling above him. The light outside told him that it was way past time to get up, but he had yet to dredge up the energy to face the coming day. Annoyed by the cheerfulness of the bright sun, so diametrically opposed to his mood, he rolled over and buried his face in the pillow with a groan.

Today was not going to be a good day. It was his first full day back at work after the Osiris fiasco in Egypt, and Daniel was not looking forward to getting back in the saddle. Being at the SGC had been hard enough over the last six months and, with the added emotional backlash of losing another person he cared about to the Goa'uld, Daniel wasn't sure he'd be able to handle the now familiar stress of his working environment. That stress had an easily identifiable source, namely one Colonel Jack O'Neill.

Rolling back to face the ceiling again, Daniel decided to indulge in a little psychological masochism and trace the problem back to its origin to see if he could figure out exactly why things had started to go wrong. After Sha're died, he'd felt completely lost; his entire purpose was disintegrated with one blast from Teal'c's staff weapon and, for a while, he hadn't been quite sure what to do with himself. However, even though he had obviously hoped for a happier resolution, Sha're's death was a release for both of them. Her slavery to Ammonet was ended, and Daniel was freed from the obsessive quest to find her that had been driving him ever since she had been taken. True, she had given him a new task, that of finding her child, but the part of him that had been bound up with his love for her and his guilt over her enslavement was suddenly broken open and left prey to new feelings.

Loneliness had swooped in to claim him; his newfound freedom from the obligation of enforced celibacy had combined with the realisation that his marriage was irrevocably over to make him ached for companionship and intimacy. He had reached almost blindly for the next available opportunity and succumbed all too easily to the charms of Kira. Of course, in keeping with his usual luck, she had turned out to be The Destroyer of Worlds and had eventually walked out of his life with no memory of their time together, leaving him once again alone.

Unexpectedly, Daniel had discovered that he was actually relieved by this turn of events. His attraction to Kira had not been based on any real feelings for her, but had simply been a reaction to his loneliness, and he was glad the situation had resolved itself without anyone getting hurt. He took the time to examine the state of his heart and further realised that, while he still grieved for Sha're, his grief was based more on sadness and guilt at not being able to save her than any continuing sense of personal loss at her death. Daniel had loved her deeply, but the separation of two and a half years, combined with the illusion she had sent him, during which he had essentially dealt with her death, had gone a long way towards healing the void of her absence in his heart.

It was in the months that followed that a whole new and unexpected set of feelings slowly began to make itself known. These were feelings Daniel came to see he'd harboured, in a diluted form, for years and that only now, when there was no obstacle to them in the form of the hope of finding Sha're, were given free rein to develop. The object of these feelings should not have come as a surprise to him and indeed, it was more their strength and very existence that was unexpected than the person at whom they were directed - for that person was Jack.

Jack, who had taken Daniel in when he'd first returned, bewildered and bereft, from Abydos. Jack, who had risked his own life to come back for Daniel when he had been enraptured by the universal language at Heliopolis. Jack, who had faced the barrel of a gun and responded with love and understanding when Daniel had been suffering withdrawal from his sarcophagus addiction. Jack, who was always there with a word of reassurance or a comforting pat on the shoulder whenever Daniel needed him.

That is, until recently. Daniel had kept his feelings to himself, unsure of how he could act on them, given their close working relationship and military surroundings, and had in fact been quite content to enjoy Jack's friendship and solid platonic presence in his life. Sure, they disagreed on a lot of things, but Daniel felt their frequent arguments were mostly beneficial in presenting differing responses to any given situation and making it easier to select the correct course of action. He and Jack made an effective team, their differences being one of their strengths.

Then, something had shifted. The change had occurred around the time of the attempted replicator invasion of Earth. In the moment when Jack had told Daniel to destroy the submarine with him and Teal'c still trapped aboard it, Daniel had felt his habitual mask of casual friendship slip, and had allowed the full force of his love to flood into his voice as he had protested Jack's order. Jack had stared beseechingly into his helmet camera and, in the split second before the Asgard transported Jack and Teal'c to safety, Daniel had been sure he'd seen an answering love in Jack's expression. There had been an instant of profound connection between them, an honest exchange of true feelings at a time when both men realised they would have no other chance to express them. It had been a painful epiphany for Daniel, where he had been offered a dream he had thought impossible at the same moment that it was wrenched away from his grasp forever. Then, the intervention of the Asgard had exquisitely placed that dream back within reach. Or so he had thought.

The incredible anticipation with which Daniel had awaited the return of the others from the Asgard ship was unceremoniously quashed when Jack reappeared only to be his usual, casual, flippant self. Daniel might have been able to accept that but, inexplicably, Jack's attitude to him had started to change, and not in the way Daniel had hoped. Affectionate teasing had become barbed insults, feigned inattention had become outright dismissal, friendly arguments had become angry fights. The physical closeness they had once shared so unconsciously turned into an awkward avoidance of contact. Jack had refused even to listen to Daniel's suggestions time and again, instead following ill advised, irrational or downright violent courses of action on their missions, seemingly entirely unwilling to consider more peaceful or diplomatic solutions to the problems they faced, simply because it was Daniel who was presenting them.

Daniel watched as Jack withdrew from him bit by bit, and was horrified to realise that the other man was slowly turning back into the cold-hearted, ruthless bastard he had been when they first met. Any overtures Daniel made to try and salvage their friendship were met by a wall of cold, hard stone that Jack seemed to have erected between them, and Daniel was at a loss to figure out why this was happening or what he could do to stop it.

Now, he faced an unsympathetic reception from the person most important to him, at a time when he was in desperate need of comfort. Daniel knew, from recent experience, that Jack would likely ignore the events that had taken placed in Egypt, or even turn them into a way to criticise him, and he wasn't sure he'd be able to maintain the tenuous control he'd established over his emotions in the face of that.

He turned his head and looked at the clock on the nightstand. He was going to be late, and that would only make things worse as it would give Jack an easy target to begin the day's hostility. Daniel knew the problems wouldn't disappear by wishing, and he also knew he had no choice but to face them. He'd wallowed in self-pity more than enough for one morning, and it was way past time to stop being pathetic and get a hold of himself.

"Get up," he said aloud in a tone of disgust at his own malaise. "Get up, get dressed and go to work - now!"

His reluctant body obeyed the command of his will, and he started to ready himself, both physically and mentally, to face the day.

* * *

Sure enough, Daniel exited the elevator on Level 28 of the SGC five minutes after the official start to that meeting's briefing. He all but sprinted to the locker room, throwing a breathless apology over his shoulder to a startled airman he nearly flattened along the way, scrabbled into his BDUs and made his way with all possible haste to the briefing room. Predictably, the rest of his team and General Hammond were already there, clearly waiting for him. Jack looked up with a barely concealed sneer and remarked with his characteristic sarcasm, "Nice of you to join us."

Daniel slid into the seat opposite Sam, who glanced at him from beneath her eyelashes with a hesitant grin. "I'm sorry I'm late, General," he said, pointedly ignoring Jack.

Hammond graced him with a tolerant smile, seemingly oblivious to the tension. "That's quite alright, Dr Jackson. I trust you are fully recovered?"

"Yes, sir," Daniel replied confidently. Inwardly, he briefly wondered how many more times he could be subjected to a Goa'uld ribbon device before his brain was permanently scrambled. Perhaps repeated short bursts enabled the mind to build up some kind of resistance to it; he'd have to get Janet and Sam to investigate that. Then again, he thought as he dragged his attention back to the situation at hand, maybe he was suffering some lasting effects, if his current concentration span was anything to go by.

Sam was summarising the MALP readings from the latest planet they'd discovered.

"It seems to be around mid-Fall on the planet, just before harvest time, and there are several interesting plants we've spotted that I'd like to investigate."

"What about the people?" Hammond wanted to know, looking at Daniel with a clear expectation of him answering the question.

Daniel managed to dredge up some enthusiasm and gradually warmed to his subject as he spoke. "Well, there's no evidence of activity round the gate, but the UAV discovered a village not too far away. We can see no sign of Goa'uld presence or influence on the planet, and the people have developed to a mediaeval level. The most interesting thing about the village is that it seems to be built to a Roman plan, with a rectangular wall surrounding it, four gates and a gridlike road system. The biggest buildings have columns and frescoes much like Roman temples. It's the first time we've seen architecture like that on another planet, and the only link I can think of is that the Ancients apparently spoke Latin."

"So you believe this settlement may have some connection to the Ancients?" Hammond sounded intrigued, and Daniel was encouraged by the apparently interested audience.

"Considering the Ancients seem to have left this galaxy long before the Goa'uld started transporting humans through the Stargate, I don't see how," he continued, "but I'd certainly like the opportunity to find out if I can."

"Alright, you have a go," Hammond decided. "The mission is set for 1300 so you have time to make your preparations. Dismissed." With that, he rose abruptly and strode off to his office.

Jack got up too, but paused, leaning his hands flat against the table. "You heard the man - 1300 hours." He fixed a hard stare on Daniel. "Don't be late." The words were said lightly, but Daniel felt the sting of their mocking undertone nonetheless. He lingered as first Jack, then Teal'c headed out of the room, but was surprised to find Sam waiting behind with him.

Once they were alone, she caught his gaze with concern in her eyes. "Daniel, have you got a moment for a quick chat?"

Daniel was startled by the earnestness of her expression and found himself nodding without thinking, even though the last thing he wanted was to have a heart to heart with Sam. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate her concern or value her friendship - far from it. He loved her almost like a sister and took great pleasure in the things they shared. However, he didn't want to discuss his current problem with her, because of her position both within the team as Jack's subordinate and also within the military structure surrounding it. On top of that, he had the feeling there was something odd going on between Sam and Jack, too, ever since the incident with the Tok'ra armbands and the whole za'tarc disaster that had followed it. She was far too much a part of the problem to be a helpful confidante.

"I'm betting from the way your eyes are still half closed that you haven't had time yet for a proper cup of coffee this morning," she said, adding with a wry grin, "Your place or mine?"

"Yours," Daniel chose, managing an answering smile of his own. "I'm all out."

"That's a very sad state of affairs!" Sam exclaimed in mock horror. "The world must be falling apart at the seams when Daniel Jackson runs out of coffee!"

She had no idea just how accurate a description that was for Daniel's state of mind, which highlighted another reason Daniel had not sought her out before now. Sam was a good friend and a wonderful person, but she was also a scientist through and through, and relating to people had never been her strong point. As a soldier, she also seemed to think of her emotions as a weakness, which meant she often had trouble dealing with them. Empathy was not a skill she possessed in large store and, for all her good intentions and sincere concern for his well-being, Daniel simply was not comfortable airing his innermost feelings in her company.

However, it would be difficult to reject so direct a plea for conversation, so Daniel duly followed Sam up to her lab and waited silently while she prepared the promised cup of coffee. Eventually, she handed him a steaming mug and sat down opposite him.

She was characteristically blunt when she spoke. "Daniel, are you alright? You look tired and you seem more. subdued than normal. Are you sure you're not still suffering the after effects of the ribbon device?"

Daniel pasted the most reassuring smile he could muster on his face, relieved that she automatically assumed the cause of the problem was physical. "Really, I'm fine, Sam," he told her. "I'll admit I am tired - I haven't been sleeping all that well since we got back from Egypt - but there's nothing wrong with me apart from that. I'm perfectly capable of handling the mission, if that's what you're worried about."

A small flicker of hurt crossed her features, and Daniel realised how what he'd just said had sounded. He quickly continued, "I really appreciate your concern, Sam. It's nice to know someone cares enough to check up on me."

In response, Sam reached out and placed her hand over one of his. "Of course I care about you, Daniel," she said. Then, after a brief pause, "Are you still worried about Sarah?"

This was another subject Daniel wasn't eager to discuss, but it was better than the Jack situation, so he capitulated and decided to open up a bit, if only to keep her off the scent of what was really bothering him.

"I can't help but feel responsible in some way," he confessed, which was nothing but the truth. Sarah's possession by Osiris and subsequent disappearance from Earth had hit him hard, dredging up all the bad memories from when Sha're had been taken. He saw that Sam was about to protest, and ploughed on. "Oh, I know it wasn't my fault that she came into contact with the Osiris jar, but I feel as if I should have been able to stop him getting away, if only I'd figured it out sooner." He sighed. "Sometimes it seems as if everyone I care about is doomed to slavery at the hands of the Goa'uld."

"I know how that feels," Sam commiserated. "I mean, look at what happened to Jolinar and Martouf."

"None of us have had an easy ride. I think it goes with the territory." Daniel made a conscious effort to avoid slipping into depression. "But I've learned to focus on the battles I think I can win, and try to accept the ones I can't. It's not easy, but I think I'm getting there."

"Well, as long as you're alright," Sam concluded. "I guess we'd better start getting ready for the mission.

They both stood up, Sam to start collecting her supplies and Daniel to make his departure. Daniel ran his hand down Sam's arm and then gave her fingers a quick squeeze, before making his way to the door. He paused as he opened it, throwing a glance back over his shoulder. "Thanks, Sam."

Her answering smile told him she was glad to think she had helped.

As Daniel made his way down the corridor in the direction of his office, a familiar voice called to him from behind.

"Daniel Jackson."

He turned to see Teal'c approaching him.

"Hey, Teal'c."

The Jaffa's expression was sombre. "I wish to apologise for my absence during your confrontation with Osiris," he intoned.

"You had no idea what was going on, Teal'c," Daniel pointed out, beginning to get slightly weary of reassuring his friends that he was alright and they hadn't done anything wrong. "There's no need to apologise."

Teal'c was evidently not ready to let the incident go so easily. "It is a warrior's duty to stand beside his brothers in arms in their time of need."

A brief shiver of pleasure penetrated Daniel's mood at the realisation that Teal'c thought of him in these terms, and he felt a rush of affection for the big man. "I know you would have been there if you'd known."

Then Teal'c unknowingly twisted the knife in the wound as he continued, "O'Neill and I were most distressed when we returned from O'Neill's cabin and learned what had transpired in our absence."

Daniel refrained from commenting that Jack had actually prevented Teal'c from offering assistance, and was now conspicuous in being the only one of his friends who had not taken him aside to check he was alright. As he left Teal'c to continue his journey to his office, Daniel couldn't help but think it was typical of his luck that Jack was the only one of the three he had wanted to do so.

* * *

Part Two

At five minutes to one, Daniel was waiting at the bottom of the ramp when Jack walked into the gate room. He noticed that Jack's stride faltered marginally at the sight of him, and Daniel indulged in a small smiled of triumph. Jack said nothing, merely giving a curt nod of approval before taking his place in front of the gate, leaving Daniel feeling slightly petty in his enjoyment of his victory.

He was still feeling as if he had somehow been wrongfooted as he stepped through the event horizon on the other side of the wormhole. It was a hike of about half an hour to the village the UAV had spotted, and the four members of SG-1 made the trip in uncomfortable silence. Uncomfortable for Daniel, at least; he didn't know how much Sam and Teal'c had picked up of the tension between himself and Jack. The conversations of earlier that morning told him they had at least noticed his lack of spirits, but they had both apparently attributed that to the after-effects of the Osiris mess, which suggested to Daniel that they were unaware of the other cause.

Thinking about it, Daniel realised it was quite possible that there wasn't actually anything for them to notice. Jack had always thrown sarcastic quips Daniel's way, had always argued the soldiers viewpoint to Daniel's scholar or diplomat, had always been exasperated by Daniel's lack of military discipline. It was only the tone of Jack's behaviour towards Daniel that had changed, and it was probably that only someone looking at the relationship from the inside would be able to sense the shift. Daniel's own lack of a good-natured response was likely much more noticeable and, as Sam and Teal'c had proved earlier, could easily be explained by the litany of unpleasant experiences that had befallen him in recent months.

Daniel was pulled from his inner musings by a sudden shout from up ahead, and he looked up to discover that they were just approaching the outskirts of the village. The shout had apparently come from a youth dressed in a knee-length tunic and sandals, who was now speeding away from them, back towards the buildings they could see in the distance.

"Lookout?" Sam queried.

"It would seem so," Teal'c confirmed. "I predict we shall have a welcoming committee when we arrive at the village."

"But will they be a welcoming welcoming committee, I wonder," said Jack.

As it turned out their reception was nothing if not enthusiastic. By the time SG-1 arrived at the gate in the wall surrounding the village, a number of people had gathered to greet them. A woman in a floor-length belted dress of deep purple stepped forward, her hands raised palm upwards before her.

"Praise the gods!" she cried with obvious fervour. "They have answered our prayers and sent warriors to rid us of the monster!"

Jack threw a glance back over his shoulder and mouthed "monster?" at Daniel, who could only shrug in response. Clearly, they had walked into something far more complicated than their initial investigation of the planet had suggested, and now found themselves right in the middle of a situation with no information.

It was time for Daniel to go to work. There were two aspects of what the woman had said that worried him; of course, the most obvious was the mention of a monster, but he was also concerned by her reference to gods. The presence of active religion in the cultures they encountered more often than not was linked to the Goa'uld, and the last thing Daniel wanted was to encounter one of more of them unexpectedly.

Daniel made a snap decision that information was more important than playing along with the expectations of the villagers. He didn't like masquerading as messengers of the gods unless absolutely necessary - it was too much like the manipulations of the Goa'uld - he didn't sense that honesty on his part would endanger them in any way.

Moving out slightly in front of the rest of his team, Daniel addressed the woman as the apparent spokesperson of the villagers. "To which gods do you refer?" he asked her non-commitally.

She looked surprised by his question. "Why, Sol, the Light Giver, of course!" she exclaimed, gesturing up at the sun, which was valiantly shining through the thin cloud cover, "and His sister Luna, the Lady of the Moon." A hint of wariness crossed her expression. "Are you testing us, my lord?"

Daniel smiled at her reassuringly. "This is no test, and I am no lord. I'm afraid you have mistaken our purpose here, though if you are in some kind trouble we will help you if we can. We are peaceful explorers from a planet called Earth. My name is Daniel Jackson, and these are my friends, Colonel O'Neill, Major Carter and Teal'c. We came through the Stargate - the stone ring set in the fields some distance from here."

The woman's face had fallen as Daniel started speaking, but renewed hope shone from her eyes as he concluded his speech. "If you came through the ring, you must have been sent by the gods to help us, whether they revealed to you their purpose or not," she stated confidently. "I am Renya, Head Woman of this our village. You are welcome here in our time of need."

She gestured for them to follow her, before turning and leading the way into the village. Daniel remembered to glance over for confirmation from Jack, which he received in the form of another curt nod, and went after her. Renya's words had told him several things. The villager's association of travel through the Stargate with a connection to the gods spoke of their transplanted origins, but their clear worship of an apparently benevolent sun god and moon goddess suggested little, if any, contact with the Goa'uld, and certainly none in recent times. The Latin derivation of the names they used for their gods confirmed his theory that the Ancients were somehow involved.

They walked through the precisely laid out village to one of the larger building situated near the centre. Daniel noticed that the rest of the group that had met them at the gate kept throwing surreptitious glances in their direction, their expressions a mixture of awe, excitement and the occasional hint of fear. Renya simply strode confidently ahead, seemingly completely at ease with their arrival and sure of her interpretation of their purpose there. She was obviously a strong leader, and one whose opinion was greatly respected by the rest of the village.

Many of the houses they passed had people standing in their doorways, openly gawking at the strangers as they passed by, but Renya paid them no attention, leading them straight up the steps and into the main chamber of the building they had reached. The room contained a large wooden table with sixteen ornately carved chairs placed around it, and Daniel guessed it was most likely the meeting place for whatever form the governing body took in the village. Renya sat down at the head of the table, and the rest of the villagers followed suit, filling up the other places. Four remained standing, taking up positions in a line behind Renya's chair, thus leaving the right number of seats empty for SG-1 to sit at the table. The four displaced people, three men and a woman, looked to be the youngest of the group, which suggested to Daniel that age was a mark of status in their society; it would be the lowest ranked members of the ruling council who would be expected to sacrifice their chairs for visiting dignitaries. It also made sense, in that the younger people would be better able to stand up for long periods.

Sam looked as though she was about to protest stealing chairs from the villagers, but Daniel managed to catch her eye and give her a small shake of his head to stop her. It would most likely offend their hosts if they were to refuse such and obvious offer of hospitality and respect. He sat down in one of the empty chairs and the rest of the team followed his lead.

"So, you mentioned a monster?" Jack didn't waste any time in cutting to the chase. His expression was carefully schooled to portray concerned interest, though Daniel could tell he was somewhat bemused by the villagers' supposed plight. Daniel could well imagine he was inwardly rolling his eyes at the clichŽ of a monster terrorising a mediaeval village, and was probably on the verge of asking if they would be presented with the king's daughter as a reward should they succeed in ridding the land of the menace. Jack's thought processes in these situations were as transparent to Daniel as if he had been inside Jack's head. He only wished he could read Jack's mind as easily on the subject of their relationship - or rather total lack of one. Now was not the time to dwell on such things; Daniel mentally berated himself for his lapse in concentration, and turned his attention resolutely to Renya's response.

"Indeed, yes," she said, her face grim. "The monster came from the mountains to the west and has been causing trouble for nearly one cycle of the moon. It steals or mutilates our livestock and we have only been lucky so far that it has not managed to catch any of our people as they tended to their animals."

"Can you tell us what it looks like?" Sam wanted to know, clearly intrigued.

Renya turned to one of the men who stood behind her. "Methen has seen the creature close to, and is the only one of us to have done so. Will you tell our guests of your encounter?"

The man she had singled out stepped closer to the table and took a deep breath. "I was looking for herbs in the forest to replenish my supplies. This was before we knew the monster had come; no-one goes into the forest now, especially alone. There was a rustle in the undergrowth to one side and I hid behind a tree, thinking it might be some wild animal and not wishing to disturb it. What I saw made my blood run cold; I would have fled that moment but I was paralysed with fear and could not move. It was most likely that which saved me from detection. The creature that stepped out of the bushes walked upright like a man but was taller even than Gil the blacksmith. It's skin was a poisonous green and covered with jutting spikes of bone that tapered to sharp points. It had no ears to speak of and but three fingers on each hand, but those fingers sported long and vicious claws, and its mouth fair bristled with pointed teeth. Filthy furs covered its lower region and it had a makeshift cloak of some animal hide across its shoulders. It sniffed the air for a moment and I believed myself a dead man, but then the creature simply moved off into the trees in the direction of the mountains."

His account complete, Methen stepped back into place behind Renya's chair and there was silence around the table while the villagers awaited a reaction from their guests.

It was Teal'c who spoke first, voicing the thought that Daniel hadn't wanted to acknowledge. "I believe this monster of which you speak is one of a race of creatures with which we are unfortunately all too familiar. Its name is Unas."

Most of the men and women in the room looked shocked by this revelation, but Renya merely nodded with evident satisfaction.

"So you have faced these creatures before and prevailed?" she asked.

"Oh yeah," Jack drawled, leaning back in his chair. "The first one we met tried to get Teal'c here to join forces with him to take over the world, the second one almost sold us into slavery to the devil, and the last one kidnapped Daniel and dragged him home to meet the folks. This one shouldn't be too much trouble, if it's un-Goa'ulded and on its own."

"You will kill it for us, then?" Renya wanted to know.

Jack started to open his mouth to reply but Daniel leapt in to pre-empt him. He couldn't believe Jack would agree so readily to slaughter a lone Unas, after Daniel's own discovery of their intelligence during his time with Chaka.

"Before we talk of killing, let me ask you this," he said. In his peripheral vision, he caught sight of Jack rolling his eyes, but ignored him, keeping his gaze fixed firmly on Renya. "Has this Unas actually attached any of your people?"

"Well, no," she admitted, "but it regularly steals our livestock, and we believe the only reason it has not targeted us is that those unfortunate enough to be outside the walls when it approaches have managed to reach the safety of the village before it could catch them. However, it becomes bolder with every foray onto our land and it can only be a matter of time before it attacks the village itself."

"I don't -" Daniel was about to launch into a lecture on the society and habits of the Unas, when he was forestalled by the frenzied entrance of a young man into the room.

He skidded to a halt just inside the door and panted, "The monster. the monster is coming!"

There was an immediate clamour as the council members all rose to their feet and made varying exclamations of fear and surprise. Renya raised one hand, calling them to order in an impressive show of control.

"Now is the chance for our visitors to see our tormentor for themselves and perhaps demonstrate to us their true purpose here. Let us take them to the gate to face the monster!"

Daniel caught Jack's eye as they were ushered out of the building and across the village to the gate in the opposite wall from the one where they had entered. Jack merely shrugged, as if communicating that they might as well at least investigate the monster upon which the villagers' minds were so resolutely fixed. Daniel could certainly understand their fear and preoccupation, but he hoped he would be able to persuade them, and if necessary Jack as well, that violence was not the only solution to their predicament. He was also further intrigued by the presence of an un-Goa'ulded Unas, if that was what the monster proved to be, on an inhabited planet that had links to the Ancients.

Renya and the villagers stopped at the gate, only opening it just enough to allow SG-1 passage, and closing it firmly behind them.

"Good luck," Daniel heard Renya call over the wall. "May Sol shine on your endeavours."

Jack led the team away from the village in the direction they had been pointed in by the lookout.

"Keep alert, kids," he said as they approached the pasture where the livestock grazed. "We don't know how this thing might react to people who don't run screaming from it."

In actual fact, their first encounter with the 'monster' turned out to be rather an anti-climax. When they reached the pasture, they found what was indeed an Unas, dragging a freshly killed animal back towards the treeline. It was certainly large, but Daniel thought its movements seemed almost laboured, and its skin was closer to grey than green. He wondered if both those things might be signs of age in the species, but didn't have enough information on the subject to reach a confident conclusion.

They were still some distance away when the Unas suddenly stopped in its slow progress, sniffed the air and looked up in their direction. On seeing them, it froze for a moment, dropped its prey and loped hurriedly off into the trees. At the first sign of confrontation, the dreaded monster had run away.

"Let's see if we can follow it back to its lair," Jack suggested. "Once we've got it contained, we can make a decision on what to do next."

Daniel could easily guess what Jack's idea of how to resolve the situation might be, but he held his peace, recognising that now was not the time to spark what was bound to be a long and vehement argument between them. He would wait for a better opportunity to air his views, and hope that events would not run away with them and force them into undesirable (at least to him) action in the meantime.

He was saved the concern over a premature confrontation and also provided with the opportunity to air his views by the fact that darkness descended unexpectedly upon them after they had been tracking the Unas through the forest for about half an hour. As soon as it became impossible for them to make out its trail, Jack called a halt.

"There's no point us trying to carry on in the dark," he decided, "but we've come too far to make heading back to the village a viable option. We'll camp here for the night and pick up the trail at first light." As the others began to set down their packs, he added, "Boots on, no fire. We don't want to make it any easier for our friendly neighbourhood Unas to creep up on us in the silent watches."

Daniel saw his chance. "Why do you automatically assume it's going to attack us? You saw how it reacted to our approach - it ran away, and left its catch behind so as to be better able to escape."

"All the more reason for it to be looking for food now," Jack countered. "We forced it to abandon its dinner, so it must be getting hungry by now. Besides, earlier, we presented an aggressive front on our own turf, so naturally it retreated. Now, it has the advantage of familiar ground, and it may assume we'll be relaxed and off guard as we've stopped for the night." He sighed, clearly exasperated. "Daniel, it's my job to plan for the worst case scenario, and experience tells me an Unas is not something to be sniffed at. They're big, tough, hard to kill, and prone to viewing humans as a good choice for the main course at dinner, as you should know better than anybody."

Daniel had to admit that all of these were good points, but it was Jack's narrow-minded attitude to which he objected, not the validity of his arguments. He was able to defend his own point of view, granted, but he wasn't willing to consider that of anyone else.

"And I suppose your first choice for tomorrow is to track the Unas down and kill it?" Daniel asked.

"If necessary, yes." Jack wasn't afraid to present his standpoint. "On the one hand, we have a big, stinky monster, on the other hand we have a population of humans." He raised each hand in turn to illustrate his point, and then waggled the hand that represented the village. "I know where my sympathies lie, and so should you."

"Why should I?" Daniel shot back. "We know that un-Goa'ulded Unas are intelligent beings with an established society and a developing culture. I conceded that this one is causing a nuisance to the villagers by stealing livestock, but it's made no attempt to attack any humans, and I can't agree that it deserves the death sentence simply for trying to stay alive." Hands on hips, he pinned Jack with a penetrating glare. "Why is violence your automatic answer to everything?"

"And why do you insist on trying to make friends with every barely sentient creature we meet?" Jack demanded, meeting and holding Daniel's gaze. "You got lucky last time, Daniel, and you know it. If the rest of us hadn't turned up when we did - yes, with our violent means of solution - your little friend would have been pasted by that other Unas, and you along with him. You saw what happened - they decided the issue with a fight to the death. Violence is the only thing these creatures understand."

Daniel's frustration was growing. Why couldn't Jack see that the Unas were just as much individuals as humans were, with the same range of characteristics. "In the kind of primitive society in which the Unas live, physical strength is a prerequisite for leadership, because the harshness of their living conditions. Of course they follow the strongest male; it's the only way they can survive. But Chaka proved that they have the capacity to learn and evolve. We communicated on quite a sophisticated level in the end, and he came to understand that humans should be considered as potential allies, not as a non-sentient source of food, which is more than you seem to be able to do, Jack. Your insistence on continually referring to them as 'stinky monsters', based purely on their physical appearance, is incredibly prejudiced. Just because they look different to us, there's no reason to assume they're inferior. That's not an attitude you'll tolerate amongst humans, so I don't see how you can indulge in it when considering another species. I thought you had more intelligence than that."

It seemed Jack wasn't about to surrender, however. "And I would have thought you'd be more intelligent than to endanger yourself, the team, and a whole village of people by chasing the fantasy that peace and love abound in the universe," he threw back with customary sarcasm, "but you continually prove me wrong on that score. After all we've seen and all we've suffered over the years, it amazes me that you can still be so na•ve and blind to the dangers of a situation."

"And after all the beauty and diversity we've encountered, it amazes me that you can still be so stubborn and narrow-minded," Daniel countered. This argument had been a long time in coming and his anger at Jack's actions and attitude over the past few months came boiling to the surface, eager for release. His own levels of sarcasm grew in response to Jack's. "It must be ever so nice to see the world in such clear-cut terms of black and white. Monster is ugly, so it must die. I thought you'd changed over the last five years, Jack, but evidently I was wrong. You're still the same arrogant, cold-hearted bastard that planned to detonate a nuclear warhead on Abydos, aren't you?"

Jack opened his mouth to continue the argument, but then shut it again with a snap of his teeth, as if biting down an angry retort. His expression closed off, becoming flat and emotionless, and he dropped his gaze to his feet.

"I'm going to check the perimeter," he muttered before turning on his heel and stalking off into the trees. He was out of sight in seconds.

Sam and Teal'c had been silently observing the argument, their attention switching backward and forwards from Daniel to Jack like spectators at a tennis match, but now Sam spoke up, her tone subdued. "I don't think any of us should wander off alone."

"Oh, let him sulk, if that's what he wants," Daniel retorted, still too annoyed himself to consider the situation rationally. "He won't go far, and he'll be back as soon as he's cooled off a bit. He won't thank you for going after him when he's in a mood."

Sam reluctantly acquiesced, and together the three of them continued setting up their camp.

* * *

Part Three:

Jack stomped away from the camp, his mind reeling from the impact of Daniel's final words. Was that really what the younger man thought of him? And was that opinion in actual fact supported by Jack's actions over the past few months? He didn't want to admit it, but he hadn't been handling what he'd come to refer to as The Daniel Situation very well at all.

It had all started back during the whole mess with the metal bugs on the Russian submarine. Trapped and about to be overrun, Jack had ordered Daniel to destroy the submarine with him and Teal'c still on it. There had been palpable despair in Daniel's voice as he tried to deny the necessity of the order, and it had broken Jack's heart to force the act of destruction onto his friend. However, of more import was the hint of something other than despair he thought he had heard in Daniel's anguished calling of his name. That something had sounded an awful lot like love, and it had prompted and answering surge of feeling from deep within Jack, which had taken the Colonel completely by surprise.

He hadn't been sure how to react to it, so he had just ignored it on returning to the SGC. Then, during the few days' leave they had all been given at the conclusion of the incident, he had actively avoided Daniel in order to have time to analyse his feelings. He had immediately begun to see that their emergence actually made a whole lot of sense; what was there not to love about Daniel? He was intelligent, caring, passionate and brilliant. He had not only single-handedly put the puzzle of the Stargate together and got it working, but in the process he had also put the broken pieces of one Jack O'Neill back together and got him living again. Jack had rediscovered the joy of exploration and the wonder of the universe through Daniel, who had given him new purpose and new direction. And now that Sha're was really gone, there was no obstacle to Jack's feelings. No obstacle, that is, except Jack's own inability to embrace them.

During that leave, with no contact with Daniel to confuse the issue, Jack had come up with a hundred reasons why he could never pursue a relationship with the other man. On top of the fact that it could get him court-martialed if it was ever discovered, it would jeopardise the dynamic of the team. He couldn't be an effective leader if he was thinking more about one of his troops than the others. Getting closer to Daniel would alienate and endanger Carter and Teal'c. He and Daniel would have to live a lie in their working environment and that would put unbearable strain on their private lives, which were already imposed on so much as to make having a relationship virtually impossible in the first place.

When it came right down to it, the only real reason Jack refused to acknowledge his feelings was fear. That's right - big, bad Colonel O'Neill was afraid; afraid that he had been mistaken and that Daniel could never return his feelings, afraid that he'd screw things up and end up losing his best friend. So, he had decided to lock his feelings back up in whatever corner of his being they had sprung from and pretend he'd never discovered them. As it turned out, it wasn't that easy.

As soon as he had returned to work, Jack realised that he couldn't ignore how he felt about Daniel. He found he now looked at the other man in a completely different light and, the more time he spent in Daniel's company, the worse it got. Rather than disappearing, his feelings grew and intensified, making it impossible for things to go back to the way they had been before between them.

Now, as he thought about what Daniel had said, Jack saw that in trying to protect his friendship with the other man, he had in fact destroyed it. He had done precisely what he had been attempting to avoid doing; the only way to conceal his feelings had been to push Daniel away and take his attitude to the other extreme, being overly critical and unnecessarily harsh in his effort to maintain an even keel. He had also, in fact, endangered his team or the success of a mission on more than one occasion by refusing to listen to Daniel, thus producing the very situation he had feared would result from an admission of his feelings.

Jack had made a royal mess of things, and now he wasn't quite sure what to do about it. It was most likely far too late for him to change his mind and pursue Daniel after all. Daniel would probably never forgive him for the way he had been treating him, and Jack would hardly be able to blame him for that.

His self-analysis and self-recrimination session concluded for the time being, albeit not exactly satisfactorily, Jack decided he had better get back to camp and see if he could salvage some decent leadership skills from the travesty he had recently been enacting. He heard a rustling noise behind him and wondered if it was Daniel coming to find him. Perhaps there was some way they could put their friendship back together again, and now would be as good a time as any to start.

Jack turned around, and was confronted, not by Daniel, but by the Unas, which loomed suddenly out of the darkness right behind him. Caught completely off guard, Jack stumbled backwards in alarm, tripped over a tree root and crashed headlong to the ground. His last thought, before his head struck a sharp rock and he lost consciousness, was, "Oh, crap!"

* * *

It was twenty minutes after Jack had left them, and their minimalist camp was completely set up. Daniel looked at his watch nervously and wondered what Jack was playing at. Even if he'd been absolutely fuming, it wasn't like him to just vanish on a mission. It was exactly one of the things he always drilled into Daniel - not to go wandering off. Perhaps he should have let Sam go after Jack right away, after all.

As if echoing his thoughts, Sam said, "The Colonel should have been back by now."

Still somewhat riled from the earlier argument, Daniel's first impulse was to retort that Jack was a big boy and could take care of himself. But, as he listened to Sam try unsuccessfully to raise Jack on her radio, a shiver of fear made its presence known deep in the pit of his stomach and he resisted the urge. Instead, in a rare moment of deference to a military authority, he turned practical. "So what do we do?"

Sam looked anxious, and she worried her lower lip with her teeth as she considered her reply. "I'm reluctant to leave the camp unguarded and go searching the forest for him in the dark. We know there's a potential hostile out there, and I don't want to risk one of us getting lost or attacked in unfamiliar territory at night."

Daniel rose abruptly to his feet in protest, his anger transforming instantly to desperate worry, tinged with a generous helping of guilt. "But we can't just leave him out there alone all night!" he exclaimed. "What if he's hurt or he's been taken by the Unas?"

"There is nothing we can do to help O'Neill at this time, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c told him firmly. He softened his bald words with a sympathetic hand on Daniel's shoulder. "Any attempt we undertook to locate him would only result in us endangering ourselves."

"Besides," Sam added, in an obvious attempt to look for the bright side of the situation, "you did alright when an Unas took you, and if we set out at first light, we'll be much closer behind than we were tracking you."

Daniel refused to be reassured. "Jack's not exactly likely to try and make conversation over dinner, though, is he?" he remarked.

"We will find him," Teal'c said with unarguable confidence, "as we found you."

"Get some rest," Sam advised. "We'll all need to be alert tomorrow."

But Daniel knew he would never be able to sleep. He also knew that if anything happened to Jack because of his childish stubbornness, he would never forgive himself.

* * *

Jack came back to awareness slowly, but his military training sensed unfamiliar surroundings and prompted him to remain still until he could figure out where he was. The throbbing pain in his head was a bad sign, as was the fact that he seemed to by lying in an ungainly heap on some kind of hard, damp surface. As he allowed his body to wake up bit by bit, his mind worked overtime to try and fill in the gaps in his memory. Gradually, the events of the night before filtered through the fog in his brain, and the deduction of where he might be presented itself with pressing urgency.

He cracked open one eye and searched his limited range of vision for clues. Above him, a ceiling of lichen-covered rock told him he was most likely in some kind of cave - an Unas kind of cave, his fearful brain pointed out, but he told it to shut up for the time being. Something was moving off to one side of him, so he rolled his head very slowly in the directions of the noise to better his view. What he saw transformed the churning mass of apprehension in his stomach into a cold, hard lump of fear. The Unas was sitting between him and the cave mouth, and it was holding his P90.

The fact that it was holding the gun upside down and shaking it as if trying to see if anything would fall out didn't make Jack feel even slightly better. As he knew from bitter personal experience, someone with no clear concept of how to work a gun could be just as dangerous as someone who knew exactly how to use one, if not actually more so since they would be a danger to themselves as well as others, and the consequences of their actions could not logically be tied to their intentions.

Jack didn't think he moved, but suddenly the Unas looked up and focused all of its attention upon him. He toyed briefly with the idea of pretending to still be unconscious but decided he'd rather be able to keep an eye on the Unas. It made no aggressive moves towards him, merely fixing him with its feral gaze, as if waiting to see what he would do now that he was awake. Jack was actually trying to figure that out for himself. Escape was not currently an option; he was stiff, his brain was still rather fuzzy, and there was a big, stinky and very alert monster between him and the door.

Being careful not to make any sudden movements, Jack gradually worked his protesting body up into a sitting position, and returned his captor's gaze. The Unas watched him the whole time, but did nothing. After a moment, it seemed to lose interest in him and went back to its scrutiny of the P90.

Unexpectedly, Jack found himself wondering what Daniel would do in this situation. Then he remembered that he knew exactly what Daniel would do, because Daniel had actually been in this situation not so long ago. Daniel insisted that the Unas were intelligent and inquisitive creatures, with their own language and culture and, while Jack was still uncertain as to the extent to which they could be reasoned with, it was clear that fighting his way out would be impossible. Perhaps it was time for him to try Daniel's tactics for a change.

"Hi there," he began, causing the Unas to look up again sharply. "Uh, nice cave you have here." He accompanied his words with a gesture that encompassed their surroundings, and ended with a smile.

The Unas reacted by growling low in its throat and shifting forwards slightly, its body language unmistakably threatening. Belatedly, Jack realised that humans were pretty much unique in being a species that regarded the baring of teeth as a friendly gesture, and he quickly closed his mouth. The Unas settled back on its haunches but kept its eyes on Jack, obviously still wary. Jack sighed inwardly, and decided to try something different. He'd seen plenty of Tarzan movies in his youth and he also knew that the exchanging of names was an important step in establishing any kind of relationship. Once you knew someone's name, it made it more difficult to regard them as potential prey.

He pointed to his chest and said clearly, "Jack."

The Unas cocked its head to one side and snorted.

"Hey," Jack responded, keeping his tone light and soft. "I'm trying to be friendly over here. There's no need for you to make fun of my name." The Unas merely looked confused. "Okay, sorry - keep it simple. Right." He pointed at himself again, and repeated, "Jack." Then he extended his arm out to point at the Unas, trying to make his expression as innocently questioning as possible. "And you are?"

If he was hoping for instant bonding, he was sorely disappointed. Instead of providing its name, the Unas reacted by reaching forwards and batting Jack's arm away from it with a blow hard enough to leave Jack's fingers stinging from the impact. He cradled his hand to his chest and sighed again. He'd never realised how volatile and unpredictable these first contact situations could be. There were so many things that could be misconstrued, and his admiration for Daniel's skill in handling things like this started to grow.

* * *

First light found Sam, Daniel and Teal'c packed up and ready to move out. They followed Jack's path from the night before, with Teal'c taking point, Sam bringing up the rear and an impatient Daniel between them. It wasn't long before Teal'c raised a hand to alert the other two that he was stopping, and Daniel craned his neck to look over the big man's shoulder at what lay ahead.

They were at the edge of a small clearing, but Daniel couldn't see anything remarkable about it at first glance. It wasn't until Teal'c knelt down for a closer look at a particular patch of ground that he noticed the stems of the plant around it were broken and the leaf litter had obviously been disturbed.

"O'Neill fell here," Teal'c announced in a low tone, as the other two gathered behind him. He rose and moved forward a couple of pace, then stooped again to pick Jack's radio out of the undergrowth. Then, he pointed out a partial footprint in the mud; a footprint that showed only three toes. "The Unas dragged him from the clearing in this direction. There is a clear trail." Sam and Daniel exchanged a worried glance, and then followed wordless as Teal'c led them resolutely onwards, only stopping briefly twice more to recover Jack's sidearm and zat, which were scattered along the trail.

As they walked, the emotions swirled around in Daniel's head like the clouds at the centre of a maelstrom. He couldn't think clearly about anything; all he knew was that Jack was in danger and he couldn't bear the thought that their last words to each other had been spoken in anger. It was that old, tragic clichŽ; you should never wait to tell someone how you feel about them as it might turn out to be too late. He had allowed things between himself and Jack to fester for far too long; while it was true that it was mostly Jack's actions that were causing the problem, Daniel knew he had never made a real effort himself to confront Jack and attempt to get to the root of it. He simply took the abuse or, as he had the night before, threw it back in Jack's face with equal fervour, provoking an irrational fight. The worst thing was that he was almost sure there was some kind of misunderstanding between them that ought to be easy to resolve. He knew there had to be a rational explanation for Jack's sudden change in attitude, but the opportunity to reason it out never presented itself or, if it did, he was too wrapped up in his emotions to take advantage of it. It seemed he could make friends with an Unas, but couldn't sort out his relationship with a man he had once been close to, and to whom he wanted to get much closer still.

Daniel's thoughts were interrupted by Teal'c stopping once more up ahead of him. He focused his attention back on his surroundings and saw that they had reached the entrance to a cave, set in the rock at the foot of what must be the start of the mountains the villagers had mentioned. Daniel stepped up next to Teal'c, and Sam joined them on the Jaffa's other side.

"Let me go in first," Daniel requested softly. He held up a hand to forestall the inevitable objections. "There's still a chance we can resolve this without bloodshed, as long as the Unas hasn't hurt Jack, of course. I think I should be able to talk to it."

Sam was silent for a moment, then she replied, "Alright. But at the first sign of trouble, we take it out."

"Agreed," Daniel said.

Then, taking a deep breath, he ventured slowly into the dim cave. He hesitated a moment in the entrance to allow his eyes to get used to the lower light level before continuing inside. It wasn't a big cave; Daniel had barely taken two steps when he was confronted by the back of the Unas, which was watching a fairly calm-looking Jack.

Jack looked up at Daniel's entrance, which alerted the Unas in turn to his presence. In seconds, the creature was on its feet and had spun around to face him. Daniel spread his arms, palm-down, in a calming gesture and breathed, "Cha'akaa" from the back of his throat.

The Unas stared at him, its movements suspended in surprise. Daniel pointed towards Jack without taking his eyes off the Unas, and continued, "Jack. Ka naan."

Unexpectedly, the Unas mirrored his gesture, and repeated in its gruff voice, "Ka naan. Jack."

Now it was Daniel's turn to be surprised as the Unas growled out an entire speech of guttural sounds and he struggled to make them out and translate them in his head.

When the Unas had finished speaking, Daniel said, "Cha'akaa" again, and then turned to Jack. "Hey, Jack," he said with studied nonchalance, which he hoped would mask the intense relief he felt at having found his friend apparently unharmed, "you okay?"

Jack replied in an identical tone, "Sure, Daniel. I've been doing my best to make friends with our host here, but he seems to like you better."

"It's a knack," Daniel said, continuing the banter that had been missing from their interaction for so long.

He was surprised when Jack just stared at him, his expression unreadable, but something deep and emotional shining in his eyes. Daniel was caught by those eyes, lost in the connection he suddenly felt with Jack, a connection that seemed to cross the gaping chasm between them and bring them together for one brief moment of understanding. Then, the situation reasserted itself and the connection was gone, but Daniel had the feeling he would be able to find it again when he looked.

Teal'c stepped past him and offered Jack a hand, pulling him to his feet with ease, while Sam stood to one side, eyes still on the Unas. Daniel turned back to the creature, about to attempt further conversation, when he heard movement from the cave entrance behind him. The Unas looked up in alarm as the sound of a bow being fired sounded in the cave and suddenly there was an arrow protruding from its chest.

The Unas roared its pain and confusion and surged forwards towards the threat, shoving Daniel into the cave wall as it went. Before anyone could do anything, several more arrows joined the first, forcing the Unas to its knees. Daniel whirled round to see a group of villagers crowding into the cave, all with expressions of grim satisfaction on their faces, as the Unas struggled to remain upright, whimpering in fear and agony.

The leader of the villagers stepped forwards and Daniel saw that it was Methen, the council member who had related the first sighting of the Unas to them the day before. He nocked another arrow in his bow, completely ignoring Daniel's shouted protest, took aim and fired it directly through the creature's left eye and into its brain. The Unas gave an almighty groan and toppled over to lie on the ground, unmoving.

Daniel rounded on Methen and found himself faced by eight men, all with cocked bows pointed in his direction. In his anger at what had just happened, he didn't care.

"What the hell did you do that for?" he demanded. "It wasn't threatening anyone!"

Methen ignored his question and directed his own words to the whole of SG-1. "You will come back to the village with us, and there the council will decide your fate."

"Our fate? But what have we done wrong?" Daniel asked, but Methen would say no more.

The rest of the villagers kept SG-1 covered while Methen removed their weapons, dropping them all in a pile at the back of the cave. Then they were herded outside and back towards the village, with a harsh command from Methen not to speak to each other or to the villagers. And so the trek back to the village passed in uncomfortable silence, with Daniel wondering how a situation he had thought completely under his control could have gone so bad so quickly.

Renya and the rest of the council were waiting for them upon their arrival. Methen gave a brief bow and launched into his report.

"We followed the strangers as instructed, and they led us to the monster's cave, where we discovered they were in league with it. So, we killed the monster and brought them back with us for your judgement."

Daniel protested, "That's not true. We-"

Renya raised her hand and commanded, "Silence!" Then she turned to Methen with a look of approval, and commended him. "Well done. You have performed a great service to your people and your bravery and leadership will be recorded in the village history to be remembered for all time. As for these," she indicated SG-1, "we will allow them to return from whence they came. Take them to the stone ring and make sure they leave."

Daniel was going to attempt to reason with her, but the jab of an arrow in his back and a warning glance from Jack made him think better of it.

They were escorted back to the Stargate, once more in silence, and Methen watched impassively as Daniel entered the combination for Earth into the DHD and the wormhole formed within the circle of symbols. As he followed the others through the event horizon, Daniel couldn't help but be bitterly disappointed at how the mission had turned out. None of his questions had been answered, an innocent creature had been slaughtered and they had inadvertently made enemies of the inhabitants of the planet. However, at the same time, he also wondered if perhaps he had regained something incredibly precious to him - Jack's friendship. Only time would tell.

* * *

Part Four:

Jack watched Daniel throughout the debriefing, his heart aching for the distress he saw in his friend. That was the problem with Daniel; he always felt things so deeply. It might not always show, but anyone who knew Daniel well could tell when he was hurting. That was the reason Jack was kicking himself throughout their report to Hammond; now that he thought about it, Daniel looked no different to how he had looked for the most part of the last six months. That meant that Daniel had been hurting for the last six months, and Jack now realised that he had been the one doing the hurting.

Daniel's voice cut through his thoughts and he listened as the younger man explained what he had learned in the Unas' cave, more pieces of his heart breaking off as the story was revealed.

"The Unas was old," Daniel was saying. "He had been exiled from his tribe and sent away alone, to die." At Sam's horrified expression, he continued, "They lead a harsh and primitive existence, and they can't afford to carry any of their number. So, as soon as an adult is no longer able to provide for him or herself, the rest of the tribe drive them out. It's the only way for the majority to survive. Anyway, this Unas discovered the village and saw the livestock as a way to stay alive. He had no intention of harming any of the people; in fact, he would gladly have communicated with them if they'd allowed him to get close to them." Daniel met Jack's gaze with a sad smile on his face. "He never intended to harm you either, Jack. He was lonely; all he wanted was a friend. The villagers didn't need protecting from the Unas, it was the other way around."

Sam's expression was troubled, which told Jack there was something about the mission that she didn't understand. He knew she hated that and, sure enough, she leapt into the pause created by the end of Daniel's speech.

"Why did the villagers do such an about face in their attitude towards us?" she asked no-one in particular. "Renya was so adamant that we were godsent, but then she told Methen to follow us; it just doesn't make sense."

"Perhaps Methen and his companions were merely sent as witnesses to our endeavour," Teal'c suggested, "and his misunderstanding of the situation led him to believe our intentions were unfriendly towards his people."

"But Renya didn't seem surprised that we were brought back to the village in custody," Sam argued. "It was as if she was expecting that we wouldn't kill the Unas, despite her assertions to the contrary when we arrived."

Daniel had listened to this exchange in silence, his brow furrowed; now Jack prompted him, interested to hear the thoughts that were so obviously swirling around inside his head. "What do you think, Daniel?"

"I don't know," came the quiet reply. "Maybe my telling them we hadn't come expressly to answer their prayers changed her mind after all. I'm sure my question about the Unas attacking the village didn't reinforce her convictions. It's possible the other council members over-ruled her." Daniel's voice rose slightly, and Jack could hear the frustration in it. "If they'd only let me explain, they could have learned that the Unas aren't their enemy. They didn't even give us a chance to defend ourselves. The worst thing is, when the next Unas gets too old to be useful to the tribe, or a young male decides to go exploring one day, it'll happen all over again. And it's all so unnecessary!"

There wasn't really anything else to discuss. Hammond was disappointed that they hadn't gained anything useful from the mission, but agreed there was little they could have done differently under the circumstances. He told them to file their reports by the end of the day and then dismissed them.

Jack decided he needed to talk to Daniel, but he didn't want to do it on base. He also didn't want to give Daniel the chance to brush him off, so he asked the airman at the gate to contact him when Daniel signed out and, when he got the call, he followed Daniel out of the mountain. It wasn't hard to catch up to Daniel on the road down towards Colorado Springs, and Jack had every intention of tracking Daniel all the way to his apartment building and demanding entrance if necessary. It was an extremely pleasant surprise then, when Jack realised that Daniel was not heading to his apartment building, but rather to Jack's house instead. Jack wasn't sure what it meant, but he figured it was a good sign that Daniel would be open to conversation with him.

As he pulled into his driveway, Jack saw Daniel disappearing up the stairs to the roof, but didn't follow him right away. First he went into the house and grabbed two beers from the fridge, then he made his way slowly up to join his friend, stopping to hand Daniel one of the bottles before settling himself on the bench that ran around the edge of the platform.

Earth was some hours ahead of the planet they had returned from that day, so it was evening now. The sky was clear, and both men spent a few moments gazing up at the stars that they travelled to as a part of their daily lives. It was Jack who eventually broke the silence.

"I'm sorry about how things turned out today."

Daniel didn't look at him, instead keeping his eyes on the sky. When he spoke, his voice was soft and calm. "Are you?"

Anger and indignation swelled up in Jack at those words, but he was determined not to start a fight at this point, so he swallowed them back down with a mouthful of beer. Then he matched Daniel's tone, speaking quietly but with as much sincerity as he could muster. "Yes, Daniel, I am. Contrary to what you may think, I'm not a bloodthirsty maniac who believes violence is the answer to every problem."

"Well, you've certainly been acting like it lately." There was no emotion in Daniel's reply, and that in itself made Jack uneasy. He was used to Daniel wearing his heart on his sleeve, letting his emotions get the better of him, ranting and railing against the injustices of the world. The new, soft-spoken, rational Daniel was an unknown quantity, and could be very dangerous.

"I know, and I want to apologise for that, too." Jack took a deep breath and looked down at his hands. He decided to start slowly and build up to the really important stuff, giving him some time to find his courage before he laid himself out fully in the firing range. "You once accused me of having no respect for you, and I realised today that I haven't been giving you the respect you deserve - not by a long shot. When I woke up in that cave with that Unas staring at me, I nearly panicked. Then I remembered what you said in your report from 888 and I tried to do what you did. It didn't work, though. I got really lucky today - if that Unas had wanted me for dinner, he'd have been licking my bones clean by the time you got there. But you just walked right in and started talking to him - I mean, how do you do that?"

Daniel didn't respond, so Jack just kept on talking. "But that's not what's important here tonight. I've been endangering the team, making bad decisions, treating you like shit, and you deserve an explanation." He paused then, discovering that no amount of time was going to produce the courage he needed to say what came next. His only option was to plough blindly ahead, get it over with as quickly as possible and then deal with the consequences afterwards.

"The truth is, I'm in love with you Daniel, and I don't think I've been handling it all that well."

There was a derisive snort from the other side of the rook, and Daniel said, "You think?"

Jack suddenly felt like a fish trying to breathe air. His chest was tight, his palms were sweating and his mouth had completely dried out. He didn't know what reaction he'd been expecting to his statement, but this unsurprised, contemptuous agreement with him was not it. Daniel didn't seem to be forthcoming with any further comments, so Jack just kept going.

"I have no right to expect anything from you, and I wouldn't blame you in the least if you decided you could never forgive me for what I've done, but I thought it was about time I was honest with myself, and with you. I know that shouldn't make any difference to things, and I know it doesn't undo any of the last six months, but I'm just hoping we can find a way to be friends again. It's up to me to change my behaviour and earn your trust again, and believe me, I'll do my level best to do that and, even if you never want to speak to me again, it won't change how I feel about you, but I won't make an issue of that and I'll just go back to doing things right, regardless of how you."

He trailed off as Daniel finally turned to face him. The other man's face was partially in shadow, but Jack could see his eyes shining out from those beloved features and the look Daniel gave him made his breath catch in his throat.

"Jack?" Daniel said abruptly. "Shut up." Then he rose to his feet and started slowly walking across the platform, moving like a jungle cat stalking its prey. "You've been acting like an asshole, and I've been letting you. I probably shouldn't forgive you, at least not right away, but don't you think we've both been miserable long enough? You may not deserve to be happy, but I think I do, and the only thing that's going to make me happy right now is you. You see, the truth is, I'm in love with you too, and I think it's about time I did something about it."

By this time, Daniel was standing in front of Jack, and Jack was barely breathing. He looked up at the younger man and met his intense blue gaze, hardly able to believe what was happening and not wanting to move a muscle in case the bubble burst and it all turned out to be an illusion. Daniel raised one eyebrow as if in enquiry and Jack instinctively rose to his feet in answer to the unspoken command. This brought him nose to nose with the other man and he swallowed, inexplicably nervous all of a sudden. In all the undeniable dreams and fantasies he'd had of this moment, he had always been firmly in control of the situation and he now found it at once scary and exciting to be so completely at Daniel's mercy.

Jack wondered for a second what he should do next, but then Daniel took the decision out of his hands by grabbing him and drawing him into a searing kiss. Jack responded immediately, bring his arms up to hug Daniel tightly to him and eagerly allowing the younger man's questing tongue into his waiting mouth. Daniel's slight hint of stubble was rough against his own, and his growing erection met another, equally insistent, as their groins fused together.

Eventually, Daniel drew away, but did not leave the circle of Jack's arms. He gazed into Jack's eyes, his lips parted and his pupils dilated, an expression of almost primal hunger on his face that sent jolts of desire straight through Jack's entire body.

"Don't you think we should talk about this?" Even as the breathless words left his mouth, Jack was struck by the incongruity of him being the one saying them.

"No." Daniel's mouth stretched into a predatory grin and his tone brooked no argument. "Talking involves thinking, and I really don't want to be doing that right now." He took Jack's hand in a possessive grip, and said, "Follow me."

Jack readily obeyed as Daniel led him down the stairs and into the house, heading unerringly straight to the bedroom. When they got there, Daniel made short work of removing both their clothes before pushing Jack down onto the bed. Once they were lying skin to skin, Daniel kissed him again, this time sweetly and gently. Then, he broke away, gave Jack a single luminous smile and started to kiss and lick his way down Jack's body. He paused at each nipple in turn, nipping and worrying at them until they hardened, then proceeded in his journey to Jack's belly button, where he lingered for a while, nuzzling and licking at the depression in the skin. If his intention was to prevent Jack from thinking about what they were doing, it was working; by the time he reached Jack's jutting erection, Jack was a writing mass of pure arousal, and the only thought that was in his brain was how he never wanted Daniel to stop what he was doing.

And suddenly, that was exactly what happened. Daniel had just bitten his way gently up the inside of Jack's thigh, when he sat up, ceasing his caresses so abruptly that Jack actually whimpered at the loss of contact. Daniel grinned down at him and asked directly, "Do you have any lube?"

"Top. drawer. nightstand," Jack managed to gasp out.

Within moments, Daniel had found what he was looking for and coated his left hand. Then, without warning, he focused straight in on his goal and took Jack's cock into his mouth. Jack gasped at the sensations as Daniel teased the head with his tongue, then moaned as Daniel's fingers found their way in between his buttocks to the opening there. Jack's pleasure began to build rapidly, as Daniel worked first one, then two and finally three fingers inside him, all the while licking and sucking his cock with practised ease. Just when Jack thought he couldn't take any more, Daniel closed the fingers of his right hand firmly around the base of his shaft and the approaching climax receded slightly to a more manageable level.

It was then that Daniel sat up again and carefully lifted Jack's legs up and onto his shoulders. He fixed Jack with a stare full of desire and said, "Are you ready?"

"God, yes!" Jack responded immediately, his breath coming in short gasps of anticipation. "I've been ready for this for a long time."

He watched hungrily as Daniel coated himself with the lube and then lined himself up into position. Then he closed his eyes as Daniel slowly entered him, moving smoothly and steadily until his balls met Jack's ass. The feeling was incredible; Jack felt complete in a way he'd never felt before, and he opened his eyes again to meet Daniel's gaze so they could share the experience on its most intimate level.

Daniel achieved a rhythm easily, and Jack cried out at the jolt of pleasure the first time he touched the prostate gland deep inside him. He could see Daniel's excitement growing with his own and, at just the right moment, Daniel started pumping Jack's cock in time with his strokes. Jack cried out again, calling Daniel's name as his lover brought him to a shuddering climax; a moment later he felt Daniel's seed fill him as Daniel released his own orgasm with an answering shout.

Then his arms were full of sated archaeologist as Daniel gently withdrew and collapsed on top of him. Daniel nuzzled his neck like a sleepy cat and kissed him briefly before settling into his arms. Jack hugged him, marvelling at the feel of Daniel's strong back beneath his fingers. They lay there for a long moment, simply enjoying each other's presence in the afterglow of their lovemaking.

After a while, Jack stretched to grab some tissues from the nightstand, and did a quick clean-up of both of them. When he was done, he brought Daniel back into his embrace and moved his mouth to Daniel's ear.

"Uh, Daniel." he began, but was cut off before he could say any more.

"No, Jack," Daniel murmured. "Don't think, don't talk. This is right; it's the most right thing we've both done in a long time. I know it won't be easy, but when has life ever been easy for either of us? There'll be plenty of problems, but we'll face them together, and I guarantee you it'll be worth it."

Jack breathed in the scent of Daniel's hair and ran one hand down Daniel's back to cup an ass cheek. In response, Daniel snuggled closer, and Jack heard his breath starting to even out as he drifted off to sleep. Jack turned his head and kissed Daniel's forehead, then whispered in his ear, "Oh, I have absolutely no doubt of that."

THE END


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